Blood Curdling Sight Seeing in the Middle Earth
by Borys68
Summary: Lacking faith in her charms Olga, the GiME of the story, does not ogle the immaculate beauty of a certain Prince, nor the rugged good looks of a certain Ranger. She even gives the emo beefcake a pass. She appreciates the sights instead! Unspoilt nature and architectural marvels are her thing! The world is Tolkien's, stupid ideas are mine. Androidilenya edited, betaed and expanded.
1. I - First Blood at Amon Hen

AN: Inspired by Dreaming of You by Zoop, Don't Panic by Boz4PM and by the Rohirric Cycle by ZeesMuse. Cloak marriage invented by ZeesMuse and explained in "Love!Rohirrim" style Chapter 12.

Olga dropped into Middle Earth in the summer of 3018, was dragged to Imladris and impressed into the Fellowship. I feel no need to retell the story of the Fellowship between Imladris and Parth Galen. The fun starts here :)

This story has an alternative ending:

s/9774065/1/Blood-Curdling-Sight-Seeing-how-it-cou ld-have-ended-v20

Mind the space in the address, curtesy of FFN

Olga's helm can be found googling for "spectacle helm". For some reason she considered the protection of the malar bone important.

Chapter I

26th February

The sight of the Argonath left Olga speechless and in open mouth fly catcher mode. This was vintage stuff, almost on the level of the pyramids, if she remembered the books (and understood what Aragorn was saying) correctly. The Sphinx, which she had seen on a last-minute tour before the Arab Spring, didn't even come close – these two brothers were larger and of higher artistic quality. They had even managed to capture the "you shall not pass" facial expression of UK Immigration Officers perfectly.

Not to mention the fact that they were Aragorn's great-great something's. Shit, talk about living with your family's expectations of you to end up equaling your forefathers. She gazed and gazed, hardly aware of the fact that her mouth was half-open – a good thing that for once Gimli kept silent on mannish versus dwarrow stonework comparisons. The hobbits also seemed to be affected as there was an unusual silence from them, even from Pippin.

She noted that even Aragorn was changed, somehow, in such vicinity. For a moment he stopped looking like the shifty-eyed, back-alley, small time drug peddler he so resembled and instead looked like ___somebody_. Besides the wisdom and leadership (which he occasionally gave glimpses of under normal circumstances anyways) there was _majesty_ in him now, an aura that made one want to unthinkingly address him as "_Lord_".

At the camp she was still torn between not saying anything at all and recklessly blurting out some "better" course of action. She diddled and fiddled until she noticed that the time was almost up – Boromir had come back after making his ring-grab attempt. It was now or never. She wanted to wail her anguish into the cold blue sky. How desperately she wished she remembered how exactly the hobbits were taken! And taken they must be – no Hobbits in Fangorn meant no Ents, and no Ents meant ... Fucking dominos! Changing things even a little could let Sauron win – and she didn't want _that_ to happen.

She had to try and juggle two contradictory requirements – the capture of Merry and Pippin versus trying to keep Boromir alive. But "losing" the Halflings was a priority. If necessary, she'd trip Boromir herself. And even if that ended up killing her; that hardly mattered at this point – after all, she had already lived the best vacation of her life. She wiped a tear away lest anyone noticed she was upset (not to mention the fact that it made her even ___more_ unattractive, raising her from "just-below-plain-but-not-strikingly-ugly" to something a bit closer to "profoundly" ugly. Some girls looked attractive when they cried. Olga was not one of them).

Besides, if she did end up dying, she'd probably get a nice quazi-viking burial together with the Gondorian.

As unobtrusively as possible she prepared herself. She had long (meaning since three months ago in Hollin) learnt to keep her single-edged dussak by her side at all times, so she only had to prepare a medical kit and ready her crossbow and shield. She stuffed some bandages and a pouch of athelas into a bag that hung from her belt. Spying Pippin following her actions, she smiled and said, "Woman's things."

He looked away, ears reddening, hastily returning to the raised voices of the increasingly concerned "Where is Frodo?" discussion.

She wasn't even lying (much) – the rags she used every month were of the same material as the bandages, and she did drink athelas tea for her cramps. She shuddered at the memory of having her courses start when they began to climb the Caradharas – it had been awful. It made the cold even colder, and there had been no way to clean up. She had barely managed to wash them in an ice cold stream on the morning after coming down, but with no available fire she had to dry them against her body. Ugh! Having taken two spares saved her from having to sacrifice some item of clothing to keep her from the ignominy of entering the Golden Wood bleeding into her clothing, last day or not.

She sighed. This month's first day was yesterday, which was typical – always, ___always_, at the most inconvenient time. As usual she had washed that day's rag and discreetly (if that word even applied to the actual situation, considering the fact that the menfolk seemed to conveniently disappear or contemplate interesting cloud formations whenever they saw her slinking back towards the camp with a handful of damp rags) dried it at night close to the fire. After washing and drying today's, she was good for four days more. She had expanded the common wisdom of "one on, one ready and one drying" to _two_ ready. She knew that she could not to hope to reach Edoras before the evening of the 30th so she had to find someplace to wash before then, yet she still was one day ahead.

If she lived through _this_, of course.

She slung her crossbow over her shoulder and arranged the quiver at her generous hip. She then focused her attention on the Steward's son – the discussion now bordering on a row fully justified such interest, and it kept others' eyes away from what she was doing. She checked her boots and various other lacings (so many she had never had to deal with before, that had taken some getting used to) and corrected if necessary. She waited.

Once the commotion had reached its peak she slung all her ordnance where it belonged and prepared to run. The moment the appropriate hobbits took to the woods she almost followed them immediately, but saw Boromir move into the forest without his shield. That would never do. She detoured to pick it up and ran behind him, her own slung on her back. He quickly outpaced her – no wonder, with over a foot of height on her and with long legs to boot! Up to a certain point, Pippin's and Merry's voices shouting "Frodo! Frodo!" were a reliable guide as to where she should be heading. Afterwards she simply panted in the general direction she had last heard them, hoping her sense of direction wasn't completely unreliable.

Orc cries eventually told her the correct direction, thought these gradually fell silent as the last goblins died or fled. She arrived just as Boromir butchered or drove off the last of the prospective kidnappers. Not wasting breath on speech after the uphill slog she thrust the shield at the Gondorian, to his great surprise.

The shield immediately paid off when two black fletched arrows thunked into it a moment later. A new wave of goblins was coming over the hill. Boromir made impressive sounds on his horn. Among the goblins she saw some big, ugly bruisers – easily the height of Men she had seen in Bree and of broad, strong build. Well armoured too, with shields, mail shirts, and helms bearing the white hand.

While Boromir fought like a man possessed against the beasts with said helms, the hobbits at his side, she began a long range duel with the archers. A score of yards behind the knight, she reloaded, facing away from the enemy, with the shield on her back pressed against the tree she was leaning on for balance. This protected her to a large degree from return fire.

Aim, shoot, turn, back against tree, bow, foot in stirrup, two handed grip on drawstring, PULL, straighten back, put bolt in slot, turn, aim, shoot, repeat. The wonders of adrenaline and having a tree to lean upon! Some goblins kept on shooting into the melee, not caring whom they hit, or perhaps hoping that height issues would limit hits to Boromir rather than their buddies.

In short succession two roars from the big orcs announced the capture of the Took and Brandybuck. The minions of darkness began to fall back carrying the two Small Folk while simultaneously keeping Boromir at bay. His shield had long since been shattered, and she saw him take an arrow in the chest and stagger back. She screamed, fired off the already drawn bolt and ran into the melee.

The fight was a furball of thrust and parry, be it with the dussak or the shield. ___Poke at soft bits, no slashing_, she kept reminding herself, but this was by far the hardest battle she'd been in yet. She more felt and heard than saw Boromir still fighting somewhere near her despite the arrow in his chest. She was distantly aware of the fact that she was slowly collecting injuries on various points of her body but had no choice but to ignore them.

Suddenly, there was a red-white flash of pain in her face. She backpedaled a few steps. She could barely see her opponent through the growing darkness and somehow managed to parry the rain of powerful blows. Her shield was being hacked to bits and there was a growing pain in her left arm.

She let the remains of her shield fall and raised her sword, trying to stave off what could the final blow, when a voice came echoing through the trees.

"Elendil! Elendil!"

Her opponent half turned and was skewered by the Ranger. The fight was over.


	2. II - Legging it across the Riddermark

Chapter II

Olga was swaying on her feet. She tasted blood in her mouth and spat red onto the forest floor, wincing. Her cheek guard had been driven into her ... well ... cheek. Boromir was on his knees with two arrows in him, gasping for air. Aragorn was giving him a tense look-over. By the words she caught it sounded as if Boromir was choking out the hobbits' fate and imploring Aragorn to mount a chase. And gushing out about the ring grab, she presumed, as Frodo's name was repeated.

"Aragorn..." She spit out blood and repeated her rasp, "...Aragorn!"

He looked in her direction and, apparently only just noticing the blood on her chin, looked as though he wanted to jump to her aid. She waved him off.

"Heal Boromir. Have athelas. Have bandage. You heal him!" For once, her clumsy Westron would do – not bad, considering she'd only been learning since she arrived in Imladris less than a year ago. She unfastened the bag, shuffling over to them.

"Have water too." She tried for a smile, but probably only ended up grimacing.

After exhausting her meagre supply of Westron swear words and much richer repertoire of the same from several modern Earth languages, Olga finally got Aragon to tend to her wounds in "unseeming places". Getting him to stitch her breast almost made her cry in frustration.

"No ... " she groaned, illustrating the action of sewing and pleading, " ... not nice look. No get man." She wriggled her fists in her eyes to ram the message home. "Boo-hoo!" This made him go even redder than before. And the guy was almost 90! Probably discovered self pleasure before her grandfather was born... He was as bad as US television, the viewers of which seemed to freak out over a hint of a nipple. In Europe, by comparison, unbridled boobs bounced across the TV screen all the day long.

She whispered to him that everything happened as it should have, with one pair of hobbits legging it to Mordor, and another being legged across Rohan. She kept the change concerning Boromir to herself, but insisted on putting the Horn of Gondor, broken during the melee, into one of the boats and pushing it off into the Falls. She was also adamant that the Hunters tell anybody who had the right to be interested that Boromir's ultimate fate was not known, that he was very heavily wounded and left under her care at Parth Galen.

She had been cut and jabbed in several places, but nowhere seriously. Her left arm was basically one big bruise from mid forearm to the shoulder – a reminder of the gradual destruction of her shield. Nonetheless, she demanded Aragorn stitch her wherever possible – she tried to keep her scarring to a minimum. She was a woman, after all.

She was a bit worried how the gash on her right cheek will look after healing. Happily, no teeth had been broken by the hit – the cheek piece of the helmet had held enough to do its job. The leather armour was badly mauled, and she decided to risk it and discard it. It was a few kilos less to carry. She was fairly sure they would be no fighting between now and the Hornburg Castle.

Boromir was not so lucky. Naturally, he was lucky to be _alive_, yet he had also taken much more severe damage than anyone else. Apart from the obligatory minor slashes and jabs, he had an arrow embedded in his left biceps and another through his ribs. She really admired him for continuing to fight as he had.

The agreed course of action was for the dynamic trio to take off in pursuit of the orcs who had nabbed the two Hobbits. The damaged goods (her and Boromir, clearly) were to take a day's rest at Amon Hen and then follow at a fast limp along their route. Hoping she was not giving away too much, she told Aragorn that if the Hunters met with Riders they were to ask for a patrol to be sent to pick them up and take to Edoras. A healer in the group would be welcome. Hopefully the social status of Boromir would make the correct impression on the Eorlingas.

They rested the remainder of the 26th, and the next day they started limping along. The day of rest was torture – she was paying for reloading the crossbow by hand and not with the hook and could barely bend her back – she still wondered how she had managed that feat! Being scared out of her wits probably had something to do with it, she reasoned sarcastically.

Before leaving, Olga tried to find a spot with a view of the Argonath. She wondered whether she'd ever have the opportunity to come back for a closer look. Besides necessities such as food, medication and weapons, she had also decided to take along the entire stock of bolts the Galadhrim had made for her. Heavy as fuck – 200 bolts! Yet she did not remember the Eorlingas using crossbows and preferred not to risk losing the only weapon which made her useful. It did, after all, seem to be the only crossbow in Middle-earth at this time – considering the fact that it had been half designed based on her clumsy drawings and half retro-engineered by Gimli during their stay at Rivendell.

Gimli fixed her helmet to some degree – after some back-of-axe hammering, the cheek guard was no longer _in_ her cheek, simply _very close_ to it. Nonetheless, the helmet had taken upon a slightly lopsided appearance, and the rim was evidently dented in several places.

The track left by the orcs was such that even she could follow it. A good thing it was sunny, even if damn cold. As they were afraid to keep a fire going all night, she shamelessly snuggled back to back with the Prince- Steward. The second night he made a boob-grab – in his sleep, he claimed, but he got an elbow in the face for it nonetheless. Not that there was much there to grab.

Initially they trekked through the woods of Emyn Muil. After reaching the East Wall of Rohan they decided to spend the night at the top of the escarpment and not risk camping in the ravine. Boromir had an on and off fever and walked slowly. She was not much better – she felt like one big bruise with a couple of stitches thrown in for free.

On the morning of the 29th the pair descended onto the plains of the Eastenmet and trudged forward.

They noticed something like smoke to the south of their track, which had switched from due west to more of a general northwest. They turned towards it, hoping it was some sort of settlement where they could buy horses and hire a guide. Aragorn had checked and told her that Boromir was loaded – he had enough in gold coins on him to buy a village, the Ranger had explained. The closer they got to the unfocused smoke source, the more they noticed undeniable signs of there being something wrong: a dog slinking away. A loose horse. Unattended sheep. They slowly prepared themselves to see something bad. And they did.

They left several hours later, feeling sick. She had cried her eyes out and puked several times. Boromir simply looked grim and gritted his teeth. He had twenty five years of experience in looking at dead bodies – which was certainly twenty five years more than she had. While she dug what had to pass as a mass grave, he used his good arm to drag the corpses to her.

Orcs had massacred a small group of nomadic herdsmen, a large extended family, by the looks of it, from toddlers to grandma. Most of the bodies were mutilated or partly eaten, and some bore signs of torture. It was the same as what the TV news hinted at in Rwanda or Darfur, and what she had read in school about happening in her own country during World War Two. Everything she had felt Aragorn and the others had refused to tell her about this world she had found herself in – all that was here for her to see.

She preferred not to think of what had happened to the women and girls before they died. She refused to look at them too closely but their poses and the state of their clothing told their stories all too well. She had covered the corpses with as best as she could with a thin layer of earth and whatever remains of tents and wagons they managed to find. The two orc corpses – with choice cuts of meat removed – they left to the crows. They mercy-killed a few animals that were unable to move, large chunks of meat cut out from them while still alive. They released the few untouched animals they found, but sadly found nothing suitable for use as mount.

The one good thing of the detour – besides burying the dead and filling their waterskins – was that it gave her a chance to give her rags a wash.

They followed (upstream, so to speak) the tracks of the orcs, guessing that they had branched off from the main group carrying the Hobbits and were heading back to Mordor. They expected to be back on the trail of the main body of orcs and of the Hunters again within a few hours. Their guess turned out to be correct, and they stopped to make their bivouac soon after reaching the broad stretch of trampled grass.


	3. III - On Horseback Across the Riddermark

Chapter III

They continued their trek on the 30th, although Boromir was feverish more often than not.

The next morning, the Riders sent by Eomer in accordance with Aragorn's plea ran into them before they got going that day. This managed to nicely point out how weak and thus inattentive they were. She was so happy to see the Riders she barely paid heed to what they were saying, especially as their Westron seemed to be not much better than hers. They kept on repeating something about the cloak and being happy to see them and something about happy life. Probably telling them that they had been smart to keep warm under a cloak in this sunny yet cold weather, she thought. Of course being warm made life happier!

She crawled out from beneath Boromir's cloak and dragged the scarf off her head and daintily scratched her coarse, dirty, dark mousy hair (and how attractive _that_ must look). She saw bulging eyeballs and one of them stammered something which sounded vaguely like a question and had the word "woman" in it. Apparently having only her face visible (and that shrouded in a scarf) made her look feminine - while her short hair did not. So, the black eye and scabbed cheek had not detracted from her feminine appearance but her hair did. Olga preferred not to give this too much thought.

"Yes, woman. _Valkiria_," she replied, using the Rohirric word for female combatants Aragorn had taught her. Their reactions showed that they understood what she had said. She decided to continue charming them with her linguistic skills.

"Olga _Aleksdottir_," she introduced herself. "_Yarl _Boromir_ Denetorsson_, Gondor." She plodded on, contentedly waving her hand at the prone figure. The Steward's son must have been feverish again and not very conversational. "_Huskarl_," she continued, and pointed at herself and Boromir to eliminate any confusion as to her status as armed retainer. The Riders looked skeptical, however. Olga had grilled Aragorn thoroughly on Rohirric customs and knew the terminology. So maybe it was her accent, she wondered. "No more Rohan. Westron speak, eh?" she finished, smiling.

After a look-over by someone she assumed was a healer (yet whose lip smacking made her think twice about unbuttoning her shirt and made her eventually decide against unbinding her chest), they rode pinion behind the riders. The healer seemed to have done a decent job on the Gondorian's dressings, though. The Riders took turns carrying them, changing midway through the day.

"How know woman?" she asked the Rider who had produced the most spectacular eye-bulge in the morning when they made camp. He made a gesture over his own cheeks and said something along the lines of, "Too smooth to be boy."

She blushed slightly, dropped her gaze, and after a moment gave him an eye over. Quite easy on the eye, he was. This unexpected attention she suddenly gave to him evidently made him feel uncomfortable, and after she batted her eyes at him, he mumbled something quickly and slunk away to tend to his horse. She sighed – this might be a different world but some things hadn't changed. One of those things was the impression she made on the opposite sex.

When they made camp in the steppe, she marveled at how many stars were visible. With the flatness of the terrain and crisp high pressure belt, it was the most impressive sight she had seen to date – without any clouds, mountains, or forests to detract from the view.

On the 2nd of March, they continued riding and around noon arrived at Edoras. The city of Edoras and the great hall of Meduselde slowly but steadily grew against the backdrop of the foothills of the White Mountains. The place stank to high heaven of horse piss and pigshit. Only the breeze from the mountains made the place tolerable. However, the painted heavy timbers of the halls were very impressive.

The Hunters and Gandalf had already left – preceded by the exiled Grima – in the company of a reanimated Théoden, rehabilitated Eomer, and reinforcements for the army at the Fords of the Isen. Boromir was handed over to the healers and she was mostly ignored. She still managed to get introduced to Eowyn, though, although this took place at a quite noisy moment. The Princess understood the request for bathing privileges and assigned a maidservant to lead Olga to the proper place.

Roadweary and numb, she followed the servant to the bath, stumbling over her own feet. She entered and immediately made eyes like saucers, reddened, spun on her heel and sprang outside, slamming the door behind her. She now had images of prize manflesh imprinted on her brain. 100% buff beefcakes. She looked at the baffled servant and explained, pointing at herself, mumbling the word _Valkiria_ over and over. After comprehension dawned the servant reddened, too, and sputtered something which probably was an apology.

She was now led to another door from behind which she could hear cheerful female voices. Olga entered and the screams began. And buckets flew. At her face.

Soaked, socked in the eye and shoved out, she looked pleadingly at the servant. "Tell not man, please." With the Fellowship knowing very well whom she was and the Elves ignoring her regardless of gender she had overlooked that her short hair could make her _that_ terribly masculine. Originally she had insisted it be shorn to about an inch in length for fear of getting dragged off and raped, to put it bluntly. Her usual impact on the opposite sex notwithstanding. But an ounce of prevention ...

The maid entered the bathing room and after a heated and extremely audible exchange between the servant and the angry voices behind the door, she was finally beckoned to enter. Half a dozen pairs of wary and unfriendly eyes of women in various degrees of decency followed her suspiciously as she began to undress – gambeson, tunic and shirt – keeping their buckets at the ready. Her spectacular bruises and scabbed cuts, not to mention the stitches, elicited gasps and hisses – hopefully of sympathy, though it was hard to tell – from her audience. This display probably decreased the appeal of shieldmaidenhood among the staff.

She unbound her breasts and with a sigh of relief delicately rubbed the creases imprinted on her skin after a week, careful not to open the wounds. Her sewn up breast inspired the loudest gasps yet. The previously low volume of conversation between the women picked up and they began to talk – far too fast for her to follow – between themselves. She didn't even try to understand, concentrating instead on freeing her legs of clothing.

Apparently, the kind souls had taken pity on her state and summoned a female healer. Finally, somebody not treating the sight of her hairy calves as X rated porn! The healer took the stitches out, showed Olga what could be bathed and what shouldn't, and changed the dressings. God's gift she was, Godgyfu by name as she learnt later.

The girls couldn't get over her hair. She pointed to herself, said "Orc," and grabbed one of the waterfalls of waist long molten gold and pulled that girl closer, taking care not to actually injure her. Then she took the other woman's hand and made her try to grasp her crew cut. This seemed to get her point across.

She also used the bath as an opportunity for the All The Naughty Westron Words You Wanted to Know But Was Too Ashamed To Ask the Sausage Party About language session she was so much in need of. In Rivendell, her grasp of the language had been way too inadequate for this, but those two months on the road had given her a lot in this regard. Pointing, combined with the phrases _how to say_ and _what word for_ told her even more than she wanted, and made for a cheerful, giggly atmosphere.

After threatening to streak through Meduselde in her boots and spare shirt, she was issued breeches and some top garments, sized for 8 or 10 year old boys, apparently. The breeches were too long, of course, but her ass barely fitted. Nor was there a gambeson in her size – the ones for lads were too wide, sadly. The Riddermark did not have ready kit for five foot warriors.

_No XS for poow leedle me_, she mused sarcastically. Oh, well – this wasn't so bad, overall.


	4. IV - Butchery at Hornburg Castle

Chapter IV

Olga was given a pony and left Edoras some three hours after the king's departure, attached to some bottom-of-the-barrel reinforcements. She smirked to herself that had she been a bloke she would had raised hell over the "insult" – but a pony will get her to Hornburg Castle just as well as a horse, so why bother? She spent the journey marveling at the scenery - the snow caped White Mountains rising to her left and constantly keeping them company. To the right lay the the mostly open country of the forest-steppe covering the Westfold, with the dark green of the Fangorn behind it. And behind that the black-grey line of the Misty Mountains - with several snow covered peaks _almost_ in front - the whole range gradually disappearing into the haze to the right. And immediately in front there was the open sky - the Gap of Rohan. The only break in the mountains running from Gondor to the ice covered Gulf of Forochel, she remembered from a map of Eriador.

They managed to hitch themselves to the tail end of the force led by the king some two hours after dawn of the next day. (Talk about greater mobility of smaller forces.) They arrived at the castle after dark so she had to put off sight seeing for some other time. She did, however, get a mail shirt from the local armoury to wear over her bloodied and tattered gambeson. She suspected she was being misidentified as one of the underage boys dragooned into the fighting, but decided not to argue, for once. The preparations at the keep could have been dismissed with a quote from Sir Alexander Ferguson – ___running around like headless chickens._

She spied the guys but preferred not to join them as much as it pained her to keep them in dark about Boromir and herself. And she herself ached to know what had transpired with the Hobbits – had things gone according to the book? But they were ___certain_ to be in the thickest hand-to-hand fighting, and she was a bit wary of that, after Amon Hen. Also, they were near Theoden - here the movies and books got mixed up in her mind and she was worried that an attempt might be made to force her to go to the caves. She found herself a fire slot with a good view of the causeway leading to the gate. Finding such a choice shooting position with ease made her suspect that the defences were undermanned. It was on the bad side for the defenders, meaning she was shooting at the attackers' left, where they had shields. What sorry fuckwit had built a castle allowing attackers to approach with their "shield side" to the walls and archers? She'd never seen any such in Europe. Not that it mattered much now. One thing was that at this range the bolts should penetrate their shields, but on the other hand, heavy shields were not so popular amongst the opposition to begin with.

Saruman's army made a good attempt at psychological warfare, approaching in the darkness under torchlight. Once each wave of orcs and Wild Men swamped the causeway, she became an automaton, just like at Amon Hen. Aim, shoot, crossbow to hook, leg up and foot into stirrup, leg down and draw, crossbow into crook of arm, reach for bolt, bolt in groove, aim, shoot ... _Testudo_ formation or or not, with grim satisfaction saw the attackers go down from her bolts. But there were so many ...

Apart from the assaults, she was maintaining a slow shooting cycle. At her current rate, and with some two-hundred-plus bolts to go through, this gave her ammunition for almost four hours. Yet the battle was to continue until dawn, and early March nights were still long, so she took her time aiming so as not to waste bolts on unguided fire. She waiting for the mass of creatures milling in front of the causeway to step on it before she began to shoot.

She shut out the roars of the fighters, the screams of the wounded and dying. She knew that her side would win (Would it? She hadn't fucked it up too badly with Amon Hen, had she?) but the more orcs and whatnot she killed the fewer the locals would have to fight against, and hopefully the fewer widows and orphans there would be. She knew what she was fighting for. She'd seen the refugees. Like on the evening news back _home_. And when the orcs reached the caves, their fate would be the same as back _home_ - XXth century Europe included. The women would be raped and murdered, the children torn limb to limb, infants with heads smashed against the rock. Or thrown live into fires – listening to their screams and watching the mothers go out of their minds trying to save them is fun, isn't it? The orcs at that camp in the Eastenmet simply hadn't had enough to play with ...

At a certain moment, on some level of consciousness, she noticed that she was being spoken to. But she was in her rhythm and, unwilling to be distracted, waved the voice away. She finished the reload cycle and only looked around, wild eyed, after firing. It was the King, accompanied by somebody she guessed to be Eomer – the bloke looked important, yet young. The king simply looked like a king – oldish, white bearded and with the fanciest dress she'd seen in the Mark to this point. Not foppish, but with the most gold and stuff. They appeared to be making use of a relatively quieter moment to make a round of the walls.

Holding the crossbow with her left hand, she made a fist with her right, put it to her chest and dropped to her right knee. Bowing her head and trying to keep a lower, more masculine voice, she shouted, "___Westu hal Theoden Kunnik_! Olga, Aragorn friend."

___They should have no idea whether its a boy's or girl's name_, she thought. Eomer held out his hand and she passed on the crossbow for examination, keeping her gaze on the ground. They'd seen her at work, so she figured they didn't need a demonstration. She went to her stash of bolts – ___oh my God, the last roll?!_ – and unwrapped them, putting them in the quiver. Her muscles screamed bloody murder, her legs felt like sponge rolls, and the break allowed her to become better aware of the din. The royals kept on looking at her and one of them asked her something.

"I speak little Westron and I come from the far north," she blurted out, hoping this would suffice – this was a phrase Aragorn had her rehearse ad nauseam so they must have understood. Happily, some louder screams near the gate drew them away.

By the time she exhausted her bolts, she was dead on her feet, ready to slump down with her back against the battlements and sleep. At this point, she would have taken a blade across the throat as a mercy. For a moment she wondered what to do. She was in a surprisingly calm spot on the wall between the castle on to her left and the Deeping Wall to her right.

She felt she would be useless on the walls, since a runt like her could be kicked off at a moment's notice. Yet there were twelve year old boys up there (most larger than her, of course). Despite this, she felt so tired that she doubted that she could swing the dussak at all. Maybe she could head for the caves and prepare for a last stand there. But wouldn't that be deserting her post on the walls? The guys on the battlements surely were as tired as she was, so she would have to claim feminine fragility, though how to prove it quickly before being herded back or shot (beheaded? gutted?) on the spot for cowardice she did not know. Boobs well (in this case – too well) protected by gambeson and mail, so what's left – pawing at the crotch? Ugh!

Heading for the caves due to exhaustion – would not that be ___exactly_ what made guys deride feminism – however they understand it? On one hand, cries of "equal rights! equal rights! gals can do everything guys do!" and on the other, "I'm a woman and need different treatment." If she wanted to run with the boys, she had to pay for it to the hilt, then, regardless of pain or cost.

She shook her head. ___You have what you wanted, girl. It was the walls or the caves, and you made your choice, so pay up_.

Tucking away the crossbow in the fire slot she went to the passage behind the gate and outer wall. Still sticking to the "useless on the walls" (_boo! shirker!_) theory, she busied herself with dragging away wounded Eorlingas that had fallen from the battlements and killing the orcs and wild men who had met the same fate. Some were in quite good condition despite having fallen onto the cobblestones and gave her a fright (and a fight). The rhymed chant of "We are Uruk hai! We fight night and day!" coming from the fighting in front of the gate would stay with her forever ...

Growing steadily number and slower, she kept on until the cry of "back to the keep!" went up. She let herself be carried by the crowd towards the new line of defense. The fighting grew even more desperate. Then the Horn (she would venture HORN even) deafened her and got the locals excited. A good thing that somebody pulled her out of the way, or she'd have joined the "friendly fire" statistics and been trampled by the sorting cavalry.

She joined in the mop up, helping with killing of wounded orcs and Dunlendings. The Eorlings occasionally spared somebody. She never did. The more conscious specimens she found she first poked several times to make them scream, then finished them off. She was pretty sure she attracted a few scowls from the locals for this. She did not care – she had the nomad family from the East Emnet before her eyes. She suspected that one of those she finished off was a "she" - that orc had something looking like breasts under its torn jerkin, and it screamed at a higher pitch. Otherwise, it had the same ugly hairless mug, and she was not interested enough to investigate deeper.

On the ramp, she caught sight of some corpses with her bolts in them – heartwarming proof of one's contribution. Once they reached the end of the ramp, she climbed back and found an unobtrusive place to sit and fell asleep immediately. She didn't have the strength to continue the coupe de grace activity on the plain before the walls.


	5. V - Feeling petite and appreciated

Chapter V

"Lass? Lass?" Gimli was delicately shaking her. "You all right? Any wounds?"

"Not this time," she replied, stretching and rubbing her eyes. "We go Isengard?"

Gimli blinked, surprised. "How did... never mind. Yes, we are riding there. How and when did you get here? How fares Boromir?"

She gave him a progress report. He was visibly happy to see her alive and to hear that the Gondorian was on the mend. They swapped fresh veteran stories, and thus she learnt about the beauty of the caves, which she promised to see, and his bet with the Elf. Good old Gimli – he had remembered her desire to see as much as possible.

All her muscles hurt. Her knees were weak and walking was torture. She wobbled around, incapable of running, collecting her gear for the trip.

She was to ride pinion with Aragorn, since apparently she was late and there no time to fetch a horse for her. Or maybe the pony had been killed after the Deeping Wall had been breached? No matter, she didn't mind hitching a ride. It was warm, and she didn't bother with the scarf, letting the morning sun shine on her right cheek. At a certain point, Eomer rode up and started talking with Aragorn. Her crossbow caught his eye and apparently reminded him of their meeting during the siege.

"Welcome, warrior from the north."

"Welcome, my Lord Eomer."

Waving at her empty quiver, he asked what she had done later. She explained that she fought beneath the wall in the Castle. He nodded, saying that he thought he had seen her there. Pointing to her bruised cheek and black eyes he asked, "When? How?"

She shook her head, pointing to the left cheek and black eye: "Amon Hen, one week. Goblin." To the right black eye: "Meduselde, two days, girls," and giggled, hiding her mouth behind her hand. This produced a wonderful WTF expression on his face, and she felt Aragorn turning slightly to follow the conversation better.

"Mistake. I go girls bath. Girls think boy and hit and throw out." She gratuitously threw in another giggle with this.

Eomer's face was a study in confusion. Aragorn chuckled.

"Olga is a ___walkiria_, Eomer. Such mistakes happen, as she wears her hair so incredibly short. She comes from the far north, so her Westron is poor. Yet Olga understands much more than she can say, and if you give her time and let her wave her arms about, she's capable of saying almost anything."

"Mistress Olga..."

"Olga ___Aleksdottir_," she supplied to close the subject, and inclined her head slightly.

"Meduseld - mistake, no problem. Many laugh later. Good care. Healer see wounds. Lady Eowyn good house - give bath and–" Olga made a neighing noise to replace the missing word for horse. "Much thanks."

"You are wounded, lady?"

"Small wounds. One week ago."

Aragorn interjected. "Olga has some cuts and jabs from the fight at Amon Hen I told you about. Anything new?" he asked over his shoulder.

"No. Only tired. Very tired. Want to sit and sleep after fight."

She spent the rest of the ride holding Aragorn's waist with her face snuggled in his manly back. Afterwards, she hoped that he hadn't noticed that she had slept with her mouth open and drooled all over his muscular lower back.

Isengard was pretty awesome, in Olga's opinion (once she woke up to see it, that was). The tower itself was incredible, all black and seamless, and she got to see and hear ___walking_ and ___talking_ trees! She would have loved a ride but was too scared to ask. And the scenery – snow-capped mountains almost all around! No Swiss or Austrian resort could beat this, no way! The orc and human corpses floating about added a certain bleh factor, of course. But would be removed before the tourists arrived, she thought.

While the Powers That Be discussed the fate of Arda, Olga and Gimli caught up with the hobbits. She had felt rather guilty for not preventing them from having the worst time of their lives – even being ready to throw them under the bus, if one chose to interpret it that way. But they also had some pleasant moments (at least, she thought so). But they did not look damaged, were cheerful – half drunk, she'd say, and had grown – they'd cut her lead by half a head. They laughed and joked that they'd be taller than her soon. She swiped some salted pork off them. Gimli got a slice too.

In the evening, at camp, the king bade her to approach him. She didn't know whether to courtesy or bow, so she did a mix of both – lowered her head and dipped her ass a bit, inwardly wincing at how awkward that must look.

He thanked her for defending his kingdom and in an unhappy voice said something about Aragorn bringing little women (did he just say she was ___petite_?! That's not a word she'd ever had applied to her, except in jest) to fight for him. She thought the old MCP said something about the caves, meaning that next time she was out of the fight. She smiled inwardly – she had no intention of riding with Eorlings, whatever the old man's fancies could had been. Not with her riding skills. She didn't plan on adding any My Sweet Pony stuff to the Charge of the Rohirrim saga! But he kissed her hand before dismissing her, so he wasn't so bad after all. Falling asleep she felt appreciated and petite ...

The palantir commotion starring Pippin made her think of all the palantir business at Minas Tirith that was to come. Should she seek out Gandalf again? She'd told him about the change with Boromir, and after a short mind-reading session to gather whatever more information out from her that he could, he had told her some vague stuff – she had understood half of the words and the sense not at all. But he had not been not angry. Well, not livid...

Should she reveal the unsupervised Palantir use by the Steward? Maybe stop the nonsensical waste of men under Faramir in the open country before the city? But what if that would prevent Faramir and Eowyn hooking up, with no coochy-coochy time at the healers, which in turn would cause further ripples? Fuck! Whatever pain it caused her, she decided she had to keep her mouth shut, and promised herself that Boromir was her one and only step outside the line.

She wondered what disasters that decision of hers would end up causing. There still was a place in her mind that feared that she had fucked up the whole War of the Ring. She shivered, suddenly suspicious that out of the three routes to Minas Tirith, one was closing. Hearing the heavy hoofs of what had to be Shadwfax she swore quietly - she was too slow witted and option number one had just rode away.


	6. VI - Hornburg to Dunharrow

Chapter VI

The screeches of the Nazgul which passed over their camp left Olga trembling. The sound was awful and soul-shredding. Aragorn called a meeting of the Fellowship (those who remained, at least), and announced that he was taking the Paths of the Dead. Olga volunteered immediately. She had lost her chance to ride to Minas Tirith with Gandalf as she had been too slow to collect her wits. Now she had a choice between something involving (if her vague memories were anything to go by) lots of riding, ghosts, ships, and a river journey. And the alternative to that was riding with the Eorling Host. She knew she'd do better in storming the beach than fighting on horseback. So it was the spooky ghosts, then. She began to repeat the Al-anon affirmation "yes, I can do it", as though a mantra (or a prayer, for that matter).

The Nazgul had disrupted their R&R plans so they rode again towards Hornburg. A group of horseman came up from the rear and to everybody's relief (Olga had forgotten about them) these proved to be Aragorn's prolific cousins. There was, of course, a downside to this, which was shortly revealed.

_Shit,_ Olga thought. _All thirty of them are like Aragorn and rubbing "Shorty" into my face again. I must go hug Gimli_.

At Hornburg Olga finally had the opportunity to take an unrushed bath. This also gave her time to lazily pop some zits on her face. As she saw her legs once a fortnight or less and had also seen the state of the local womenfolk's limbs at the bath at Edoras, she stopped caring about body hair there. The 'pits were a different matter, however. Having hair there still felt _wrong_.

She also looked at herself and grinned with satisfaction. At Imladris all those ellith made her feel like a prize sow from a pygmy breed, but now – now her body was _much_ more acceptable. _Fuck all colour magazine diets! The way to lose weight is to walk and run around while chased by orcs for three months! And no French fries with mayonnaise, either._

She kept on admiring her flat(ish) stomach and firm buttocks, recalling a novel where the heroine had been able to crack walnuts just by sitting on them. Or was it by squeezing her buttocks? She wasn't sure, she'd read the book a long time ago. She wondered if they had any walnuts here...

She rode from Hornburg Castle alongside Aragorn, his thirty or so clones, the two elves know as The Twins, the certain elf also occasionally know as "a certain prince" and Gimli son of Gloin. At Meduseld she was engulfed in a bear hug by a mostly recovered Boromir and got a bit teary-eyed from seeing him on his legs and no longer having fever-glazed eyes.

He dragged her to one of the empty tables in the hall.

"Olga, I've talked with Aragorn about Amon Hen. The end of the fight, after they had grabbed the hobbits, all that was a blur to me. He said I was barely able to defend myself and that you – and I know how you fight – you were _defending_ me."

She interrupted him to pat him on the hand, saying, "You defend me in Moria, I defend you in Amon Hen. Aragorn not come – you dead, I dead."

"Olga, that's not all." His face became very serious. "You brought me my shield as if you expected me to fight hordes of orcs AND archers. And you came fully equipped for battle. You kept the archers busy – killed a few too, or so Aragorn says. I could dismiss you following me and bringing the shield as a combination of coincidence and quick thinking. But you came fully equipped for battle, helmet and all. And he also told me you had a full medical pack for him to use on me too, including water to clean the wounds! You simply _did not have time_ to equip yourself, prepare a bag with medicine, and grab a waterskin. It was no impulse – you very well knew there was going to be combat and that I was to be wounded. Or maybe more than wounded ... look at me. Please, Olga."

While he was talking, Olga cursed his intelligence. _The git's smart_, she thought - and had more than enough brains to sense that if something looked too good to be true then it usually was. Her being fully prepared for battle, with his shield and a medical kit to boot _was_ too good to be true, but this did not make her feel much better about breaking the news that she was meddling with the storyline, so she settled for drilling holes in the floor with her eyes.

He put his hand on Olga's shoulder, his family sized paw feeling gentle on her thick and short neck. She croaked in a small voice:

"In book you die at Amon Hen. And orcs must take Hobbits. But you are friend and I not want you die ... not like Gandalf, I know he come back later. I not tell anybody, maybe no change in history. I prepare for fight. Think we fight together. Maybe you die and I die. Maybe you live and I live. Maybe you die and I live. Maybe you live and I die. All was maybe ... " She shrugged, unable to continue.

"I owe you my life."

She patted his hand again. "Never tell?"

They also spoke of his failure (which was how he saw it, of course), and of his shame at breaking his word to defend the Ringbearer. Olga reassured him that this did not place him among the dregs of mankind. That he had been broken by the power of the Ring was true, but it _was_ a powerful thing, a thing that even a wizard or powerful Elven Lord or Lady refused to touch, worrying that it would break _them_.

He was very surprised when she slipped in the information that Gimli's crush was eight thousand years old. She noted that he was doing mental calculations – yes, the Lady could remember the times before the awakening of the Second Born, and maybe even the dark under the stars at Cuiviénen, and the light of the Two Trees in Valinor – and yet a being like _her_ wouldn't touch it.

Olga managed to beat into his skull that even after his little stumble, he got up and did The Right Thing, and that now he could go on doing the right thing. He looked at her pleadingly and asked about the course of the war. She just told him to "have hope" and smiled knowingly. They hugged and promised to meet in Minas Tirith.

She collected the bolts she had ordered – and paid with Boromir's money – from the bowyer and rode on to Dunharow with the Grey Clone Company. Boromir still needed a few days to recover and was expected to ride with the Eorlings.


	7. VII - Sojourn at Dunharrow

Chapter VII

At Dunharow Hall the Company was supposed to sleep on the floor in the hall, but Olga was given a room because she was a girl. _The nice side of chivalry_, she mused. She wobbled to bed early after she had eaten her fill, with a tray ready for her to pig out if roused too early for breakfast. She was not interested in the increasingly drunk celebration, and the groping going on with the (apparently) accommodating maidservants made her think of things she preferred not to. It reminded her of the times she had consented to sex for the sole purpose of feeling as though she were part of the crowd, with neither her heart nor her mind in it.

During the night she was awakened by a commotion under her door. The noise came from an interchange between a man and woman, with both sides sounding angry. She got up, lifted the bar on the door, and peeked out. In the torchlight corridor there was a Rider wanting more than a goodnight kiss from a maid and not taking _no_ for an answer. He had the maidservant pinned to the wall and she was squirming to get away.

Half a year ago, Olga's reaction would have been different, but after the trek with the Fellowship and facing Orcs and Fighting Uruk-hai, she had changed in more than body. She bolted back into the room to grab something hard and heavy.

She grabbed the shoulder-length cascade of molten sunset-gold and jerked the Rider backwards. The momentum carried him across the corridor and he hit his head against the opposite wall. She then began laying on him with the pewter chamber pot. He took to his heels quite quickly, once he managed to scramble to his feet – the Rohirrim sure knew how to make a mean chamber pot!

She took the girl by the arm and dragged her into the room.

"You good?"

The maid nodded.

"You want stay?"

The maid nodded again.

Good. After months of sleeping alongside somebody, or at least within snoring distance, as on the Fellowship's trek, Olga found sleeping alone strange. And she thought the girl might like a safe bed.

She cuddled back-to-back with the maid and fell asleep immediately.

After the feast, Brumhilda had not been able to dodge Adewulf. She had tried to slip away, but he followed her and finally caught up with her in a corridor of the residential area. They – the maids, that was – were not obliged to sleep with Riders, but often did so because it was fun. If cases of forced affections occasionally happened, that just was part of the life of a serving wench.

Seeing Adewulf being beat into the floor by that poor wretch was completely out of the blue. And welcome, Bema be praised! She dragged Brumhilda into her room and suggested she stay. The poor woman probably wanted friendly warmth in bed too. Knowing how much more comfortable the beds in these rooms were than those in the maidservants' quarters and wishing to avoid other prowling amorous drunk Riders there could be about she immediately decided to stay. She undressed down to her undershift and joined the abused Dunlander in the bed. With some contented grunts the woman wriggled her bum and back against her and she heard her snoring almost immediately afterwards. Brumhilda closed her eyes and almost immediately drifted off as well.

She was awakened by a desperate grip on her arm with one hand, and on her shift with the other. The unfortunate creature – otherwise rolled up into a ball - was holding to her as if for dear life! Her face was contorted by fear, her eyes tightly closed. She kept on whispering ___uruk hai ... night __and____ die ... uruk hai ... night __and____ die _into Brumhilda's breast.

She rearranged herself to hold her in her arms, which was not difficult as the dark haired girl was a head shorter than she was, and cradled her in her arms, making soothing noises. Over time, she stopped whimpering and her face smoothed.

___Bema, what has the woman been through?_

Arriving in the company of a score and half of men and evidently having been beaten made her story clear to anybody who cared to look. Her short stature, body build, dark hair and brown eyes made her origin evident. Those grim looking hulking brutes from the North must have kidnapped her in Dunland and kept her for their pleasure! And pounded her, no less – black eyes, a cut cheek, one arm heavily bruised and – Bema! – they had even cut her up, she had stitches on her chest visible through a fold of her shift. And how she walked after getting off the horse ...

The savages even cut her hair to shame her, which would make her stand out in the crowd and thus make it easier to catch her if she ran. But why keep her in pants if she was a comfort woman? That surely complicated things a bit when they wanted her. Had they torn her clothing to shreds? Poor thing!

Brumhilda shook her head. Women like her knew very well what the Riders did to the Dunlanders during their forays into the Hill Country beyond the Isen. What they said about their doings when in their cups or when they thought themselves out of earshot of the womenfolk was not nice. It certainly did not sound any better than what the Dunlanders and the orcs did in the Westffold. These tall Northerners must be of the same ilk, she decided.

The bruises and black eyes did not, however, hide the fact that she was not particularly attractive. Had the Northerners failed to catch any prettier girl? Maybe the prettier ones had been done in by now? She shuddered at the associated thoughts ... Or, maybe she had she been sold to them, as doubtlessly any Dunlander father would cheerfully get himself rid of a non-nubile daughter?

Her thoughts went back to the company the woman had arrived with. There were three almost too handsome to be real elves! Two brunets and one brown haired one. And a ginger haired dwarf - four feet tall yet with a beard almost to the floor! Had he also enforced himself on her? Ewww ... And among the thirty something brutes two were slightly shorter and kept very much to themselves. Indoors they hadn't even taken off their hoods.

Mysteries galore!

As Olga woke, she wondered what she was doing in a girl's arms. She was awake, quite homely, and as dressed much as Olga herself was. But where were the orcs? And why were her eyes puffy and her nose stuffed?

The girl – a maid, by the looks of it – just kept on patting her head and murmuring something soothingly. She hugged her closer, forcing her face into the already wet patch in her shift, pushing the flashbacks from Amon Hen (and the murdered family site and Hornburg Castle and the puddles at Isengard–) out of her mind. Moria and Hollin had been too long ago to trigger similar memories, or perhaps the stay at Lothlórien had dulled the memories.

___I really must have been in need of a good cry, _she reflected distantly.

The two women were woken up by Gimli, who appeared to freak out the local maidservant so much that she fled the room in her shift and with a shriek. The two Fellowship members exchanged a glance and shrugged at the strange local mores. Gimli brought her the dussak he had cleaned and sharpened – her efforts never passed his acceptance threshold - and a gambeson.

She hugged him enthusiastically – both for the new garment and for being shorter.

Seeing Olga at breakfast, equipped with armour and weapons and her camaraderie with Aragorn and Legolas – and apparent acceptance as equal by the grim killers – led to agitated whispers among the serving women. One of them approached her and quietly asked her a question, first in a language Olga had never heard before and then in Westron:

"You ride with them?"

Olga nodded. "Yes. Now ride Mundburg, fight orc. Valkiria from north" – she added to clarify things.

That seemed to surprise her but at the same time made her relax. Olga spied the girl she had slept with and gave her a wave. She responded with a sheepish smile.

She went to join the assembling Company. A bit to the side of the usual commotion, among the sheds, she saw that Eowyn - overseeing their sending off – had cornered Aragorn. She was very visibly unhappy that Aragorn didn't want to take her along.

___Fuck!_ Olga thought at the sight of the princess going down on her knees before rugged manliness incarnate, pleading to be allowed to accompany them.

"My God, she's that desperate?" she asked aloud, shaking her head.

Sensing Olga in the vicinity, Eowyn turned and found her, noted her travel readiness, looked back at Aragorn, and asked angrily,

- "Why can she ride with you and I cannot? What does she have that I have not?"

This was accompanied by a death glare at the height-challenged girl in question, a glare that seemed to scorn her short mousy hair and two black eyes.

With her nondescript brown eyes gleaming with irritation, Olga tried to reason with the Regent of the Mark while Aragorn demonstrated the depths his wisdom he would be later famous for as King by keeping his silence while the women went over their differences.

"I die – two, three people cry. Nothing happen. You die – all Rohan cry. Théoden say you king when Théoden go fight. How can you go? Who king when you go?"

Both Aragorn and Olga could tell that this was not what Eowyn wanted to hear, but she ceased arguing nonetheless.


	8. VIII - Paths of the Dead

Chapter VIII

Olga's horse – she called her Chestnut after her colour, as her Eorling name had not stuck in her mind - refused to enter the "_dwimsomething_" – as Olga called the Dimholt to the end of her days. The other local horse did the same – Legolas had to calm them and lead them both. The horses of the clones and the local one ridden by Aragorn did not protest quite as much.

She was scared and stuck close to Gimli – Aragorn was in front, his clones and the two elves leading their own mounts. At first the dwarf spoke brave words but quickly grew silent and had the same sort of ragged, frightened breathing as she did. Soon they were holding one another by the hand as they stumbled and staggered their way through the darkness. A darkness where something moved and whispered, not quite _there_, but close.

Against the clammy darkness the two torches – one in front and another at the back of the column – were a joke. Olga and Gimli kept close to the clone with the torch at the end of the column – she really didn't care at that point if anybody thought her a coward or not. She almost went crazy with fear and kept on mumbling fragments of prayers from her childhood and trying to hum the fragments of hymns she managed to drag up from vague memories of Corpus Christi marches she had attended as a child with her father.

Gimli apparently was doing same as he muttered continuously under his breath, and she thought she heard the word Mahal – another name for Aulë, the God of the Dwarves, if she remembered correctly – being repeated a lot. She kept her eyes on the ground immediately before her and tried to keep her ears shut. Hearing her throbbing heartbeat in her ears did _not_ help her keep her calm.

She jumped at shadows all throughout the hellish march. Similarly afflicted, Gimli apparently decided to focus on helping her to keep his wits about him. Well, that was _really_ nice of him. Just like he had taken her under wing in Imladris, selected the weapon for her and sparred with her. With his height he was a stand in for the most probable enemy - an orc. Boromir stood in as well, for Evil Man. After the torches went out following Aragorn's words about treasure she wanted to scream with terror. She settled for gripping Gimli and whimpering. Holding one another they stumbled, crawled, or staggered forward on all fours, following the sounds of the rest of the Company through the dark. Sometimes he pulled her along, sometimes she helped him to his feet.

The sound of water and scent of fresh air was like salvation. Wordlessly, communicating simply by looking at one another, they decided _never_ to speak to anybody about their unheroic passage.

They finally stumbled into the open and the riding began. Chestnut was nervous, so she kept near Legolas or one of the Elf twins, who seemed to have some sort of power over the horse which she did not. Or perhaps Chestnut was just as shaken as she was. Or maybe it was a combination of all that.

Having the whispers – she refused to look _back_ to see if anything besides the whispers was there – follow them did not help her be at ease. They rode through the night until they came to a great stone sphere half-buried in the ground. There Aragorn blew a horn, and the ghosts appeared. He talked to them and they _talked back_!

They made bivouac and Olga simply dropped. Ghosts or no ghosts, she was dead tired – pardon the pun. But at dawn, there was riding again, under a black banner with stars on it. Not a good choice, in her opinion – from a distance it simply looked black.

The next two days were exactly the same - they rode and they rode and they rode - she was perilously close to falling asleep in the saddle the entire time. Near the end of the second day, when they stopped to water the horses, her trembling legs gave way and she gracelessly dropped to her knees besides Chestnut, ready to lie on the ground right there and then. A clone – she have no idea which one, as she was blurry eyed - looked into her face and tut-tut-ted.

One of the elves gave her some sort of smelling salts to pick her up as well as something to drink – was that the local Red Bull equivalent? And they rode again and dusk fell and they rode. And they finally camped. On the third day, there was some fighting in the late afternoon, but the enemy fled on seeing the Ghosts. Some infantry joined them, or rather – began to follow them. They seemed to have slowed down, which allowed her to recover a bit but she still looked longingly at the elven booster crap from time to time.

They keep getting glimpses of the sea. On the fourth day they encountered some dispersed enemy forces which fled upon seeing them and the Ghosts – and they helped speed them on their way with great enthusiasm. She got off a few shots, and thought she might have hit somebody. She was not used to the new bolts yet.

On the fifth day, they reached the sea at a major port – there were many enemy ships there, which Aragorn cleared with the Ghosts. He released them later. Oof.

Once those were gone, they embarked on the captured ships, together with the infantry, which had followed them about, and other local forces which kept showing up. There were slaves on the ships – Olga had to wonder, how did the Ghosts know not to kill them? - whom Aragorn freed. They also wanted to fight.

She had to confess that she slept through most of that day, catching up on her much needed rest after the crazy riding. She helped with the cooking, as helping with rowing was beyond her. On the sixth day, there was no rowing for _anyone,_ as there was a good wind blowing.

She was _genuinely_ either shaping up, or the feminine beauty standards in Gondor were uniquely _different_ from anywhere else she been, or the guys were getting into the _this is the last time I may get it _mode and increasingly desperate - she was being eye-up with interest. Yay! She tried a roll of the hips - even with lust! _Go me! -_ she thought with excitement.

But such unusual male interest in such quantity made her edgy and she scampered over to Gimli and latched to him faking interest in the local birdlife in order to have a pretext to use him as propriety cushion and to get her mind off naughty thoughts. Silly of her, really, since with the Fellowship and Grey Company along, nothing untoward could happen.

They prepared for battle. Soon after embarkation at Pelargir, she talked with Aragorn about her role. Well aware of her skills in melee, Isuldur's Heir assigned her to a unit of archers from the Morthond Vale. They numbered some eighty men – the marching losses. The Ranger Chieftain explained to her that a unit _never_ numbered as many men as it did on paper. Some men were always sick, some were on leave, some were absent without leave, and some had been detached to do something somewhere else. Chuckling, Strider told her that after a day's march a company numbering one hundred men was lucky to have ninety men under the standard. And that after a week he would expect sixty, no more, at evening parade. With her mind spinning from knowledge how messy and chaotic the military actually was Olga joined the improvised company of the blokes who took the wrong turn somewhere, got the shits, got boils on their feet or whatever else and lost contact with the fief's forces led by Lord Duinhir. This band of stragglers was commanded by Seregruthin son of Haston.


	9. IX - Pellenor and Morannon

Chapter IX

Olga's account of the Battle of the Pellenor

The sight of the city was incredible. It rose like a wedding cake up the sides of the mountains, and it was white against the backdrop of dark rock.

The account of the battle written after the war by Gondorian scribes under the direction of Faramir always makes me smile – so nice and orderly, and completely unlike what actually happened. The battle proper – as various low-level siege operations continued through the night – began at dawn, around 5AM, with the charge of the Host of Riddermark.

By the time I jumped off the ship, at 9AM (more or less), Gondor's infantry had cleared the lower levels of Orcs and was holding the walls again, while Dol Amroth and Gondor both had cavalry in the field, throwing itself at the waves of Orc and Easterling reinforcements flowing in from Osgiliath, which now held the centre of the Pellenor.

This very same wave was pushing the Eorlingas southwards, away from the city, towards Harland – meaning towards us. And between us and the Rohirrim cavalry was a mass of Orcs and Haradrim. Simple? Maybe... but only if looking from above. And doubtlessly pretty on those maps that only show lines of advance and retreat.

From my point of view of about five feet off the ground, in the dust and smoke, at the best of times I had a view of up to 300 yards, and usually less. And there were four miles from my current location to Minas Tirith. Clearing those four miles between the port and the city gates took us almost seven hours of fighting.

It was a day of us, the Poor Bloody Infantry, plodding forwards in the dust cloud, and of cavalry running through the murk ahead of us from left to right, then right to left, and it was not always clear whose cavalry it was. A day of sometimes being shot at by Eru knows whom and where from, and melee clashes with Orcs and Haradrim and Orcs again. The Rohirrim tried to run us down once, too.

So, for me, it was a day of shooting at whoever we were ordered to shoot at, falling back if something threatening was too close, drawing swords if the threat went after us before our melee units could intercept them, and sometimes charging an engaged enemy's flank in support. And a day of terror when Angborn put us on mumak hunting duty – one monster almost did us in.

Shooting at those beasts at close range got me drawing without hook again, I was so scared. I didn't even try to go for the eye – too small a target for me. I generally aimed at the skull and hoped that the bolt would punch through and pierce the brain – wherever that might be. Most of my bolts went in but I never got a "drop dead" effect – action movies are a lie! The bests succumbed to several score hits.

The dust was awful – sometimes the other unit, not always our own, was almost upon us before identification was possible. Well, there were two unit types that did not present Identification of Friend from Foe problems – if it was horseman size but bipedal it was a troll, and truck size meant mumak.

With the end of the day came the final slaughter of units trapped inside the Pellenor Wall, clearing out ruined farm houses. Duinhir - we had bumped into our mother formation near the end of the day and been absorbed - gave no quarter. That's when the shield I lugged around all day – eliciting sneers from the veteran archers – saved my skin. I only picked up a few new scars.

()()()()()()()

After a wound-free Helms Deep, Olga needed stitching up again. Not to mention another entry in the "My Ruined Reputation" diary. She was glad that her mail shirt - knee length on her, thigh length on anybody else – had worked exactly as advertised – _you won't get sliced, but you'll be bruised like no tomorrow_. Besides the spear which penetrated the mail and scraped her ribs along the bra line, of course.

"Looks like I'm never going to wear a bikini again," Olga sighed aloud. _And at this rate of scaring I'll be able to make an impression on gangsters_, she mused as she plodded her way in the falling darkness towards Minas Tirith. She wondered – had Boromir lived through the day? As events seemed to be running as written otherwise, she assumed the others should be all right, but he was a loose cannon. Some horsemen were passing by and startled her with a joyous cry:

"No, that's not an orc! I know that helmet!"

_Shit! My petiteness will get me killed some day._ Olga winced, promised Legolas a slow strangling and cried out, "Aragorn!" He wheeled his horse towards her, and to cheer herself up after orc comment she added: "Sew boobs again. Or no get boink and cry!" This made the non-majestic heir of everything everywhere wince at her expanded vocabulary.

But before he got to attend her slight injuries, she quietly told him that anybody could do that, and that he had more important things to do. Olga pressed a pouch with the remainder of athelas she had been carrying since Lothlórien into his hand and whispered in his ear:

"Go to healer house. Eowyn fight Nazgul and wounded."

Aragorn looked at her searchingly, so she explained:

"Book say. Need athelas and king hand. Book also say Faramir wounded poison arrow."

That got him quickly moving towards the city.

It was one of the Grey Company – an unexceptionally dour fellow named Mielda – who stitched her up over the ribs, all the while very red faced and unhappy about the task. Afterwards, she was brought up to date – Merry was wounded, and so was Eowyn – this she knew, but feigned surprise. Pipin was an unknown, while Gandlaf was sure to be alive. No news on Boromir yet, but the Eorlingas had been spread all over the battlefield by the counterattack from Osgiliath. The Rohirrim centre and left wing had been dispersed during the fighting all over the Pellenor. Olga was too tired to care and slept like a baby in the Grey Company camp.

The next day, she joined Legolas and Gimli on their trip to the Houses of Healing looking for the Hobbits. To her great joy, they ran into Boromir with some Gondor notables, including Prince Imrahil, who she had first met the previous night when talking with Aragorn.

"You live!" Olga squealed with relief, ambling in his direction, impeded by her stitched side. The big man lifted her bodily off the ground in a giant hug, and she kissed his cheeks in glee. He had survived the Pellenor Fields!

She discovered that he had recovered his strength at Edoras and Dunharrow until the Muster of the Mark and rode with Théoden and Eomer to Gondor. He got detached from the right wing, and entered the city just after the Swan Knights under Imrahil had ridden out, before sorting out with some delayed knights again. Hence the fact that yesterday his fate had been unknown.

The local gang was getting more and more interested in who the freak show was, so Boromir was doing some fast talking to the nobs (Olga discerned "Lady Olga" and "Imladris" and "Amon Hen", as a well as Gimli and Legolas with appropriate explanations), so she gave her best head-nod and ass-dip number in greeting. This made a positive impression (or they made a very a good show of looking impressed) and they nodded back to her – apparently Boromir had exaggerated her role at Amon Hen. Some even smiled.

When the trio finally tracked down the Hobbits, they asked about Olga and the others' doings between Edoras and Minas Tirith. Gimli refused to talk, and she shuddered and grabbed the Dwarow's arm for comfort. It was up to Legolas to tell the tale.

During the wait before the departure for Morannon, Olga ran into Eowyn – she looked at her with a stone face, and the daughter of Eorl turned her head and refused to meet her eye. She knew what the strange woman from the north thought about her – and deep down she also knew that if she hadn't been fated to kill the Wraith, Eomer would be chewing her ass off.

During the march to the Gates of Mordor, Olga again attached herself to the Vale of Morthond archers. She noticed that the Lord Duinhir was a broken man who evidently did not care to live. Those days allowed her to learn some songs, and she tried to teach the men a moderate form of goose step in return, with equally moderate success. She learnt of their homeland and told them what she could of hers in return. A week later, her speech was even worse than before – to her lousy Westron, as spoken in the North, she was now adding mannerisms of the Blackroot River Valley dialect.

The zoo Olga witnessed at the Battle of Morannon was just as impressive, if not more so, than the one on the Pellenor Fields. No mumaks this time, but to her collection she added two varieties of trolls, a good view of a Nazgul on flying mount, several Orc-subspecies, and a few highly distinct tribes of men. The Gates themselves were very impressive architecture too, though she didn't have much time to appreciate them in the midst of battle.

At the battle of Morannon, melee engulfed the archers almost immediately and the last thing she saw was a spear being thrust in her face. Her last thought before the darkness engulfed her was to lament the fact that her monthly had came on the eve of the battle once more.


	10. X - Vaire catches some loose threads

All things considered Olga did not look that bad after the battle. Looking from the front she was only missing one eye. From the back, however, she was missing a big chunk of her skull and half her brains had dribbled out. Her petite body was laid out in state alongside other dead notables, between Duinhir - whose quest for death was more successful than Eowyn's, and Boromir.

While the multitude lamented the death of the Captain of Gondor, the remnant of the Fellowship were equally, if not more, heartbroken over the loss of the small brave woman. Gimli in particular looked distraught and mumbled "my axe should've stayed with her, not leaving her alone with the good for nothing archers ... "

She was buried along warriors of the Free Peoples fallen at that place that day. And then she went forgotten, neither name nor number among the Walkers surviving to be recorded by a traveler between the planes.


End file.
